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I am not really a travel photographer and very often don’t even bring a camera along. I am glad I did in Bangkok – the whole city just makes you want to photograph, amazing colors, amazing light, beautiful people and sceneries. I was going to Bangkok for my job and fortunately we had some time before and after the event to see something of the city …most of the times you travel somewhere and see nothing but the Hotel, the meeting place and the Airport.

We arrived early Sunday morning, heavily jet-lagged and dead-tired, with the option to either go to bed (and miss most of the day) or head into the city for some sight seeing. We choose the latter and took the metro and a tuk tuk to the river from where we explored some sites along the river… the temperatures were around 35C (95 F) – coming from the European winter that is quite something.

Later the afternoon we got back to the Hotel, enjoyed the pool and headed out into the local neighborhood for dinner – it became quite obvious in what kind of area our hotel was located in. Girls were offering “massages” at every corner and were quite loudly approaching you “indicating” their “interest” in you… the bars and restaurants were filled with old white ugly men surrounded by much younger thai girls. Call me old-fashioned or moralistic, but I found this to be a very disgusting sight…. from there on the week was dominated by work and I did not manage to see much more of Bangkok.

At the end of the week our event stopped at lunch time and we decided to head out again for a boat trip on the channels… some of us went back to the pool afterwards – together with a colleague I opted to just stroll around the city for some time instead… and this was fantastic. We walked around from late afternoon until the evening through old parts of the city not hit by tourism. I cannot even put into words how pleasant this was, lots of small markets, tiny streets, people everywhere, the colors, the light, pure magic… the locals are such wonderful, beautiful, kind and friendly people, it’s a pure joy ….and such a difference to the area that is plagued by “tourism”.

I took the Plaubel Makina 67 with some Kodak Portra 400. I shot 4 rolls (40 pictures) of which you see 30 here. I am quite happy about my discipline not wasting too many shots and I am quite happy about shooting people on the streets… but I am still hesitating too much, I saw so many great images I did not get because I was too slow or hesitating… :-/

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11 Comments

Jan, these images are outstanding. The colors are beautiful as well as the captures. And I’m glad we share an opinion on the presence of the old white men… it was one of the major issues for me to look at while being there. I’m just glad that you didn’t go to Thailand with the same intention

What a great set of images, Jan. I hope you get to travel for work more often if it means you’ll be doing more of this kind of photography
It’s the whole ‘ugly white men’ thing that has always put me off ever even considering a visit to Thailand so it’s nice to see another side of it.
The more you do photography on the street the easier it gets and the better you get. Your senses will tune into things before they happen. Keep at it

I like your photography. Although I think that by viewing the photos on this site, I now qualify as an “Old white ugly men”or am I misunderstanding your comment. Is the enjoyment of beautiful girls reserved for some and not for others. This site with it’s beautiful naked females panders to anyone that arrives here.

I know it’s a long shot but do you remember where you took the picture of the house in the 2nd picture? I love your photos, a flickr fan. Next time you come to Bangkok, shoot me an email, I would love to meet you.

Hey, I tried to look it up on a map and I think it was around Dao Khanong. There is a little river flowing into the big one and that is where the first picture was taken – the second one was either just before crossing the little river or after… hope that helps you spot it. I hope I will be able to visit Bangkok one day – beautiful and very interesting city.